Individual Vocational Training (IVT)

Country of implementation

Belgium

General short description of the innovation

Individual Vocational Training (IVT) is an in-house individual vocational training scheme in which the employer gets a trainee for several months at a reduced cost. After the completion of the training, the employer is contractually obliged to employ the trainee during a period at least as long as the training period. Employers have to provide training by appointing one of his employees as a coach, who will function as personal mentor of the trainee. Duration of traineeship depends on the competence gap and can vary between 1 - 6 months. / / The measure makes use of the activation of benefits scheme. During the training period, the employer pays a productivity premium to the trainee, who retains his or her unemployment benefit. This premium gradually increases as the training advances and brings the wage at the end of the training period up to the level of the standard wage corresponding to the job trained for. /

Target group

Total Population

Policy Field

Type of Policy

public

Duration of the policy

The individual vocational training was introduced at the initiative of the Belgian federal government in 1994.

Scope of innovation

Scope: structural

Spatial coverage: IVT is introduced in 1994 by the federal government, but managed on a regional level by the regional public employment services.

General description of (intended) objectives and strategies

IVT programs aims to address (structural) qualitative shortages for employers ? p.e. jobs for which no training is organized - by providing jobs seekers with practical training on the job. / / The IVT initially aimed at the reintegration of long-term unemployed, with the aim of increasing the overall employment rate Gradually the emphasis shifted to employment of disadvantaged groups as the employment rate for these groups provides room for growth2. /

Type of ideal-typical strategy for the innovation

others (investment in human capital )

Type of innovation

new policy, practice or measure

retrenchment or expansion of an existing/earlier policy

New outputs

learning workplaces

subsidies/tax-credits

training schemes

Intended target group

unemployed

Working age population

main source of income: social protection (unemployment benefits )

Actors involved in policy-making/implementation and/or evaluation

agency or national social insurance body (Regional Public employment service (VDAB ? Flanders))

employers (organised or individual)

Clarification of the role of various actors

Firms: Most Individual Vocational Training are initiated at the initiative of firms. The firm defines the job requirements which are then verified by the public employment service. The public employment service then tries to identify the potential candidates and tailor the individual training program to match trainee aptitudes to job requirements. Firms can also search for and select jobseekers for IVT?s themselves. / / VDAB - Public employment service Flanders (PES): Together with the employer, the VDAB makes up the contract, fixes the programme and the duration of the IVT. The progress of trainees is also closely monitored by a personal VDAB-consultant. / /

Clarification of outcomes in terms of impacting resilience and labour market inclusion

Although the IVT agreement is not specifically restricted to young unemployed people, the fact that the employer can select the trainee, makes the IVT population quite selective. IVT-beneficiaries seem to be primarily young and short-term unemployed1. / / The IVT is quite effective in terms of employment after training1, however there seems to be a large gap in the outflow to work between migrant and native workers, which cannot be fully explained by differences in human capital and training characteristics2. / / Given that the program implies close monitoring, it is also costly in terms of administration. /